


The Rise of Kind and Terrible Snakes

by Ferith12



Category: DCU, Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Gen, idk - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-06
Updated: 2019-02-03
Packaged: 2019-07-07 15:22:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,103
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15910974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ferith12/pseuds/Ferith12
Summary: Dick Grayson is sorted into Slytherin.





	1. Chapter 1

It’s the year after the Battle of Hogwarts.  Ginny Weasley is head girl.  McGonagall is Headmistress.  The wizarding world is an absolute mess, and kids are traumatized but healing.  The sorting hat makes a decision.  He sorts Dick Grayson into Slytherin House and starts a revolution.

It’s not as though Dick Grayson singlehandedly changed the course of Slytherin House, and it’s not as though Dick Grayson isn’t a Slytherin at heart.  He is determined and clever and devious.  He knows how to survive, he knows how to manipulate, even at eleven.  But seven years ago, the hat would not have sorted him into Slytherin.  Because Dick Grayson is a good kid.  Because Dick Grayson is incredibly brave, incredibly loyal, despite anything an incredibly, undeterrably  good kid.  So, seven years ago, seventeen years ago, thirty seven years ago, the hat would have put the boy in Gryffindor or Hufflepuff, because the hat belonged to Gryffindor once upon a time, and the hat was biased.  The hat sees now that he was wrong.  And so, Dick Grayson, son of a Romani circus performer and a squib erased from the Great and Noble house of Black, is sorted into Slytherin.

In this world Dick Grayson is ten years old when his parents come to Gotham.  This Gothom resides somewhere in Britain, but that hardly matters.  Gotham has never deigned to care very much what nation claims to hold it.  What is important is that Gotham is over sixty percent magical.   The statute of secrecy is technically in place, just as Gotham is technically beholden to the laws and governance of the UK, and since willful ignorance is a skill which some people can be very proficient at, there are some muggles who are unaware of it.  There are still more muggles who are unaware of magic in the way that Jim Gordon, in his later years, is unaware of Batman’s identity.  Gothamites have a good instinct for dangerous knowledge, and exactly how close to get to it.  But Gotham is not like an ordinary city.  It is not a place where magic was hidden.  It is not a muggle place with pockets of magic.  It is a magical place, deeply, terrifyingly,  _darkly_ magical.

In this world the trapeze wires are cut by magic, and in this world Dick Grayson falls, but he bounces.

Unlike in other worlds, Bruce Wayne (formerly of Hufflepuff, head of the House Wayne) is not there to watch as a small child sees his parents die.  Dick Grayson is sent to Gotham’s Juvenile Detention Center, and remains there until his letter arrives.  

Dick Grayson sits beneath the Sorting Hat and the Sorting Hat gives him choices.  In Gryffindor he will be a hero, he will be watched and admired and challenged.  He will have brave friends.  In Hufflepuff he will be happy, he will be welcomed and encouraged and loved, he will be home.  But in Slytherin he will fight, he will be unwelcome and degraded and outcast, he will have to trick and bite and claw his way towards respect, in Slytherin, his friends will be few and true friends fewer.  But in Slytherin, he will protect those who most need protection, love those who most need love, save those who most need saving, in Slytherin he might just change the wizarding world for good, and eventually, he will create a home for himself.

Dick Grayson joins Slytherin House, and conquers it through the power of friendship, puppy-dog eyes, and being absolutely terrifying.


	2. Barbara Gordon

But Dick Grayson is not alone in the den of snakes.  There is also Barbara Gordon.

It the fifth year of one Harry James Potter, and a pink frilled toad has invaded the school.  Eleven year old Barbara Gordon sits beneath the sorting hat.

"Hmm..." it says, "You're quite the courageous one, aren't you, positively brimming with wit, of course, hard working and loyal too.  Where to put you...."

"I'm Slytherin,"  she says.  Tells him.  Definitively.

"What?"  the hat says.  It shouldn't be surprised by students, it sees all they are and want and should be.  But well, a head's a big place.  And the hat has grown a little formulaic in its sorting over time.

"I'm obviously Slytherin," the girl says, "Text book."

"But you're muggle."

"So.  What."

Here's something you must understand about Gotham: Gotham is the sort of place where people belong, and it is the sort of place where they do not. Gotham is a jealous city, a prejudiced city, and a magical one.  Some people say that Gotham is alive.  They might not entirely be wrong.

Barbara Gordon has Gotham written on her soul.  Gotham courses through her flesh and bone like blood and magic.  Her mother and brother are not of Gotham and they left it.  Her father is not of Gotham and stayed, one muggle against a city of darkness.

Barbara Gordon is of Gotham.  She is a child of libraries and dark alleys, secrets.  She is an observer, a schemer.  She knows about magic, about power and Houses.  Gotham is a magical city, and a Slytherin city, a place of deception and legacy.   Not all the Old Families are Slytherin.  The Waynes tended toward Hufflepuff, and the Drakes toward Ravenclaw.   But then, the wealthy began with everything, they did not have to fight.  And Gotham's most beloved are these:  of Gotham, the children of Gothamites, magical, children of magic, and Slytherin.  Barbara Gordon has magic.  She cannot change her birth, she is a Slytherin.

There has never been a muggleborn Slytherin.

"You can say whatever you like,"  Barbara says, "But I'm not leaving this chair until I'm in Slytherin."

The hat believes her.

In the end Barbara Gordon is a hatstall for nearly an hour, but in the end she is Slytherin.

It is not easy to be a muggleborn Slytherin in the years leading up to the Battle of Hogwarts.  Barbara keeps head down and her wand ready and survives, learns, thrives.  

In what would have been the seventh year of one Harry James Potter, and would have been Barbara Gordon's third, Barbara does the smart thing and stays home in Gotham.  And becomes a vigilante. 

It's more or less an accident.  She had transfigured her school robes into a rudimentary bat costume just because she could and that was awesome.  And when she heard screams characteristic of the cruciatus curse she wasn't about to run _away_  from them.  So she dressed like a bat, hexed criminals, met Batman, became Batgirl. 

The year after the Battle of Hogwarts, Barbara returned to school and befriended little First Year Dick Grayson.


End file.
